MEAD! (or, why Mark keeps bees )

MEAD! (or, why Mark keeps bees )

Why mead? Variety Stories, connection to place and time It s delicious! Unique product to share and trade Business someday?

History 20,000+ years ago: Wild-fermented meads discovered and harvested in Africa Preferred drink of ancient Greece Replaced by wine except in areas too cold for grapes, e.g. Scandinavia Modern resurgence

Types of mead Traditional: Just honey, water, and yeast Cyser: Apples or apple juice (cider mead) Pyment: Grapes (wine mead) Braggot: Malt (beer mead) Melomel: Any other fruit Metheglyn: Mead with herbs or spices Bochet: Boiled, caramelized honey Morat, rhodomel, capsicumel, oh my!

Meadmaking Equipment and supplies Resources Recipe formulation Brewing Fermenting Finishing Bottling Sample recipes

Equipment and supplies Essential Carboys (2) Airlock Brewing kettle Racking cane or autosiphon Hydrometer Thermometers Optional Aeration stone Immersion chiller Stabilizers (potassium metabisulfite, potassium sorbate) Fining agents ph meter Star-San or other sanitizer Wine or mead yeast Yeast nutrients (Go-Ferm, Fermaid K, diammonium phosphate, potassium carbonate) Bottles, caps/corks, capper/corker

Resources The Compleat Meadmaker by Ken Schramm, i.e. the meadmaker s Bible GotMead.com forums, blogs, and recipes Corvallis Brewing Supply

Recipe design Honey varieties Alcohol Sweetness Fruits, spices, and other flavors Yeast selection

Honey Base (clover, blackberry)? Varietal showcase? Blend?

Alcohol Session mead (like beer): 4-9% alcohol, 5-9 lbs honey per 5 gallons, starting specific gravity 1.035-1.065 Standard mead (like wine): 9-14% alcohol, 9-15 lbs honey per 5 gallons, starting specific gravity 1.065-1.105 Sack mead (like dessert wine): 14+% alcohol, 15-21 lbs honey per 5 gallons, starting specific gravity 1.105-1.150 Mead Calculator http://gotmead.com/blog/the-mead-calculator.html

Sweetness Dry: 0.990-1.010 specific gravity, <2.5% residual sugar Semi-sweet: 1.010-1.025 specific gravity, 2.5%-6% residual sugar Sweet: 1.025+ specific gravity Exceed yeast alcohol tolerance, or ferment dry and back-sweeten

Flavors Be creative and experiment! So far for me: apples, pears, quince, marionberries, wild blackberries, peaches, plums, blueberries, strawberries, rhubarb, mulberries, thimbleberries, elderberries, muscat grapes, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, allspice, juniper berries, vanilla beans, toasted oak cubes, caramelized honey, rose petals, rose hips Add up front, or ferment a traditional mead and then add fruits/spices

Yeast selection Alcohol tolerance Fermentation temperature Flavor preservation Flavor addition/enhancement

Lalvin D47: 14% ABV. The go-to yeast for home meadmakers, except in temperatures above 70ºF. Preserves flavors in traditional meads. Lalvin 71B: 14% ABV. Good for fruit meads, or in higher temperatures. Adds a very subtle fruit salad flavor. Lalvin D21: 16% ABV. My favorite yeast for dry fruit and berry meads; leaves a very clean finish with no yeasty or off flavors. Lalvin DV10: 16% ABV. My choice for strong cysers, adds a distinctive yeast flavor that takes some time to age out. Lalvin RC-212: 16% ABV. Red wine yeast that I used to make a very good plum mead. Requires adequate nutrients. Vin 13: 16% ABV. Hard to find, but worth trying. In a quince mead, it adds distinctive melon and tropical fruit flavors. Lalvin K1V-1116: 18% ABV. Regarded as a good mead yeast, but in my experience it can destroy subtle flavors. Lalvin EC-1118: 18% ABV. Champagne yeast, recommended in some beginner recipes but can easily produce too-dry, harsh rocket fuel mead.

The Great Heat Debate Boil it like beer, to sterilize and to precipitate proteins and wax in the honey, OR Treat it like wine with no heating whatsoever, to preserve subtle honey flavors, OR Something in between?

Meadmaking, Mark s way 1. Pour 1 cup boiling water into a glass and add 12.5 g (2 ½ tsp) Go-Ferm. Add 10 g (2 packets) dry yeast when it has cooled to 100-105º. (You can start the other steps as it is cooling.) 2. Sterilize a 6-gallon carboy, airlock, and racking cane with Star-San or other sanitizer. 3. Heat water or juice to 160º to pasteurize. Cool to 130º with immersion chiller or in cold water bath. 4. Stir in honey until you reach your desired starting gravity. Be sure to account for temperature correction with warm hydrometer readings. 5. Stir in 7 g potassium carbonate, as a yeast nutrient, and 2 T pectic enzyme if you added fruit juice.

6. Continue cooling mead to around 80º. 7. Whisk vigorously or bubble with air to oxygenate the mead (yeast need oxygen at first). 8. Siphon into carboy. 9. When your yeast is within 10 degrees of the mead temperature, add it to the carboy and swirl to mix. 10. Add 1 ½ tsp. each Fermaid K and diammonium phosphate as yeast nutrients 11. Add airlock and place at desired temperature. Fermentation should begin in around 12 hours.

Managing fermentation Keep it cool (around 60º is usually good, though different yeasts prefer different temps) and dark. Add 2 tsp each Fermaid K and diammonium phosphate 1 day after brewing (it may bubble over). Add 1 tsp Fermaid K, ½ tsp diammonium phosphate 3 days after brewing. When the airlock stops bubbling and most of the yeast has settled (usually around 3-4 weeks), rack the mead to a new carboy.

Finishing your mead Keep tasting it as it evolves. Does it need more sweetness? More acid? More body? Oak (medium or heavy toast, American or French oak)? Add spices? Vanilla beans? Berries or other fruit? If it is too dry, dissolve ½ cup honey in ½ cup boiled water and add; taste again and decide if more is needed. If you add honey, add ¼ tsp potassium metabisulfite and 2 tsp potassium sorbate to prevent the yeast from re-activating If it is not clearing, give it more time or try a clarifier like Sparkolloid these are effective but can remove some flavor as well.

Bottling Beer or wine bottles? Bottle when mead is clear and at least two months after fermentation has ended. Be sure to add sulfite and sorbate if you backsweetened. Fermentation in bottles can lead to explosions Age in carboy or in bottles; mead is best after 6-12 months, and some continue to improve for another 2-3 years.

Recipes Strong Traditional Mead 15 lbs of your favorite honey 3.75 gal water D47 yeast Ferment at 58-65º Starting gravity: 1.108 Final gravity: Off-dry (around 1.006) ABV: 13-14%

Dry Blueberry ~15 lbs honey 3.75 gal water D21 yeast Ferment at 58-65º After two weeks, rack onto 12 lbs blueberries in secondary Rack off of blueberries in another 2-3 weeks Starting gravity: 1.110 Final gravity: Dry (1.000) ABV: 12.5%

Bourbon Barrel Bochet (a good recipe to use up miscellaneous old crystallized honey) 18 lbs honey DV10 yeast Ferment at 58-65º Add honey to large pot and boil on high heat, stirring constantly, until it turns a deep brown (but not black) color. Remove from heat and carefully add water to 5 gallons. Add 45 g heavy toast American oak cubes during aging, and add 1 cup bourbon whiskey of your choice before bottling. Starting gravity: 1.129 Final gravity: Semi-sweet 1.012 ABV: 16%

Winter Spice Cyser 15 lbs honey 3.75 gal fresh-pressed apple juice 7 cinnamon sticks ½ whole nutmeg 4 whole cloves 10 allspice berries DV10 yeast Ferment at 58-65º Crush spices and simmer gently in water for an hour, add liquid and spices to the carboy with the yeast. Starting gravity: 1.142 Final gravity: Dessert (1.018) ABV: 16.7% Sip around a warm winter fire while the winds howl outside.

Questions?